Confirm humanity?

Slow broadband? Printer chewing up paper? Sat nav taking you down the wrong path? Or maybe phone freezes at the worst possible moment or to save time you've devilishly hit 'software update' in the middle of the day and then realised shit, I need to do something urgently, I need to undo this prompt now, ah but I can't. Normally the endeavour with failed technology is utter incandescent rage which in the lucidity of hindsight is irrational but at the time and in the moment, utterly justifiable.

But occasionally this tech business might entice a small up turn of the mouth. Like the other day when I subscribed to something (something else that will probably just sit in my inbox, I'll open it glance at it on the move then quickly close it and say I'll get to that later - and never, ever, do). The subscription response page was more interesting than simply 'verify your email' because the request was instead, 'please confirm your humanity.' Sure I said. What a quirky request. What genius has come up with knowing how to surmise this in what has to be a short time? How can you authenticate humanity in a nanosecond? And moreover, who is judging me about my level of humanity? Will I pass? It's quite complicated being human, y'know.

But it appeared absolutely easy, just a simple request to click a series of boxes showing traffic lights - yep ok, they're not like our traffic lights (just a STOP and GO light, no amber/orange, GET READY), but that's fine. But it wasn't. It kept asking the same thing over and over and my clicking answers were the same - the polite request becoming more puzzling than it should have been, pausing to ponder whether I should be including just the traffic lights or also the bar that holds them up and across also? This simple task eventually stopping me in my tracks to invite almost an existential crisis on around the fifth attempt before totally overanalysing whether said part of object was in the box or not and thinking in the end I don't know if this is 'right.' And then just when I thought it was right, the object magically reappeared as a motorcycle. And then I had to tick boxes that contained a motorcycle. I mean how particular are we being here? That tiny bit, does that qualify as being 'in' - shall I chance it and assume they won't notice if I missed that tiny bit? WRONG! Do it again. Although they don't tell you you failed it just glitches out and reappears with the same picture and you're then left wondering whether or not it registered your first attempt and so you do it again. But then perhaps this is the clever intention of the task. Is the intended reaction to make you dig deep into your human crevices to start obsessing about detail and debate about inclusion. Is it a really a worldwide brain research project to uncover the sharpest nation or the ones with the best comprehending eyesight?

In the end, after the deluge of grainy images that seemed to have been plucked from the dustiest of American archives on 'everyday objects' and after I could no longer remember why I was doing this and what it was I was originally subscribing to I dashed to the redemption of the corner X to just forget about this tedious task. Which then led to a jibe from the internal monologue that this may well be notching up another line of 'failed tasks' on the day to day to-do list. And then noted that technology making a small upturn of the mouth at the beginning was most certainly now a gritting of teeth and maybe a muttered 'oh fuck off or 'I haven't got time for this bollocks.'

But after the involuntary, incandescent rage fades I'm philosophical. Is it a double bluff by the clever tech people. Secretly it's telling us to get away from the screen, shut the lid and talk to each other and interact. Tech says 'I am going to make this real difficult because I want you to talk to a real person, look them in the eye and really see them and maybe also pick up a real book that you feel and touch and smell. And so I'll drive you away from this because this, and you doing this, is collective humanity on the path to obsolescence. And in my warped path to take you to confirm your humanity you'll actually do it. '

Or maybe it's the inner workings of an already crowded inbox buckling under the weight of too much information and this is a tiny step in the direction of reminding me that everything you need is already there. Just look within not beyond.